Security Constrained Unit Commitment by a new adaptive hybrid stochastic search technique

In this paper, a new formulation of Security Constrained Unit Commitment (SCUC) problem, considering more practical constraints and nonlinear characteristics than previous works in the area, is presented. The proposed SCUC formulation includes prohibited operating zones (POZs), valve-loading effects, and multiple fuel options of generating units, in addition to prevailing constraints, such as hourly power demand, system reserves, ramp up/down limits, minimum ON/OFF duration limits, fuel constraints and environmental limits. Unlike the traditional SCUC techniques that solve the economic dispatch (ED) first and then check it with the network for any violation, the proposed method solves the Security Constrained Economic Dispatch (SCED) from the UC. To solve such SCUC model, a hybrid solution method consists of an adaptive binary particle swarm optimization (ABPSO) and an Adaptive Real Coded Genetic Algorithm (ARCGA) is proposed. The effectiveness of the suggested method to solve the SCUC problem is shown on different test systems. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.